This invention pertains to corn harvesting machinery, and more particularly to a corn picking machine having a novel arrangement and drive for the gathering chain. The arrangement allows for higher forward speeds for the combine or tractor which provides the motion power and more efficient gathering of the corn crop.
Nearly all field corn is currently harvested mechanically, mostly by using a combine having a corn head. A small amount may be harvested by a picking device mounted on or pulled by a tractor. A minuscule amount may be harvested by hand in demonstrations or the like.
The mechanical devices are similar in that both the corn head on the combine and the picker use pointed row-separating apparatus to go between the rows and to pick up lodged stalks and to separate the rows. And both use similar gathering chain devices driven by sprockets to engage the ears and pull them from the stalks and to deliver the ear to be further processed by the machine. This further processing may be simply delivery to a wagon if the corn is to be stored on the ear, or the ear may be delivered to added machinery to be shelled and then delivered to a wagon if the corn is to be stored as shelled grain.
In either machine, the row separator must be properly spaced to accommodate the width of the rows as planted. In some instances, as yet rare, the plants are not set out in rows and, in those instances the points are closer together to make sure that plants do not get missed.
Any harvesting machine must be designed to minimize the dropping or missing of ears. Ears left in the field by the machines are not particularly useful to the farmer so the least possible droppage is desired. The same is true for the loss of kernels shelled off the ear in the finishing process.
By the present invention, the ears are more quickly handled and droppage is held to a minimum because of quicker and more certain moving of the ear from the stage of removal from the stalk to the husking stage of the process.